After months of preparation, this weekend we held a surprise wedding shower for my cousin’s wife-to-be. There was plenty of decorating, and of course, FOOD involved. I also made a wedding shower cake, and I will be making their wedding cake in a few weeks time, as well. I thought I would share with you a little of what was served that night.
The spread: curried asparagus bites, tapenade tomatoes, prosciutto-fig roll ups, stuffed mushrooms, goat cheese-peppercorn potatoes, asian noodle salad, mexican salad, spinach salad, orzo salad, roast beef bunwiches, tortellini …

Sorry for the lack of posting in the past few days! It’s been a couple of stressful, not-so-fun weeks, but I’m back for a special post on…birthday cake! Birthday cake is an occasional indulgence, and more often than not I don’t even end up eating birthday cake, but I do love to make them. Today is my good friend Erika’s 20th birthday, and I will be turning 20 in exactly two weeks. Erika, myself, and a few of our friends are going to be celebrating our birthdays in Whistler for …

I have to say that being Canadian, I’m pretty into hockey. My Vancouver Canucks have me sitting on the edge of my seat, cheering for the better part of each year. The Canucks just made it through the first round of playoffs (of course!) and are now heading into the 2nd round to face the Chicago Blackhawks….the team that knocked us out of the playoffs last year! Nothing like sweet revenge….! Anyways,  I decided to show some Canucks spirit in the best possible way I could, by making cupcakes….which I …

I really love having healthy muffins on hand for snacks- I just keep them in the freezer and then heat them up whenever I need a little boost. I really find that so many muffins are more like dessert than healthy snack so I think it’s better to just make them at home. These ones are fantastic- very little sugar, healthy protein packed quinoa, flaxseeds, and great flavour. I topped these muffins with a bit of butter and honey or almond butter. The quinoa makes them have a unique chewy …

I wanted to share this with you guys because it’s super exciting for me- my first paid job! I had a friend approach me needing something as a special surprise for his girlfriend of two years (what a nice bf!). The only problem was that she ‘only likes boring vanilla cupcakes with boring vanilla icing’. He wondered if I had any ideas on how to spice this up. After some thinking, I decided to put a special twist on Pioneer Woman’s ice cream flower pot, and Bakerella’s cupcake pops.
I made …

I’ll be the first to admit that by no means is this a “healthy” dessert. It contains a ton of sugar, but I wanted to make a pecan pie that didn’t contain a ton of butter, or any corn syrup. Unfortunately for my mom and I, pecan pie is probably our favourite pie!

I got the recipe here and I kept it about the same, except I substituted almond milk for the soy milk. I also drizzle a layer of dark dark chocolate over the crust and then again over the …

These are from the cookbook of the month- Rebar. They are vegan brownies and they are oh-so-delicious. Decadent and cakey, no one would ever know that they are vegan. My boyfriend (who constantly reminds me of how much I am missing out on by not eating meat, or drinking milk, etc.) loved these! When I told him they were vegan he turned up his nose a bit, but soon asked for seconds!! I just love making people realize that ‘vegan’ doesn’t mean ‘bad-tasting’. The book says that these brownies are …

Wow, November already!? This year is flying by…I already have my midterms for cooking school this week and have yet to practice or study. I guess that’s my task for tomorrow!
I hope everyone had a great Halloween, mine was lots of fun though I’m definitely not feeling to good today….I dressed up as a military pin up girl, and my boyfriend went as the military man. I love dressing up!

We also carved some pumpkins- Parker did a skull, and I did a ghost. We are very skilled carvers and it …

Enjoy some delicious pumpkin scones like I did, with a great recipe from Pinch My Salt. These really embrace fall flavours and make a great treat on the weekend or for a special pick-me-up in the afternoon. I made some changes in the recipe, as I don’t usually eat cream or milk and I thought that dried cranberries would add more to the recipe than raisins. Enjoy!
P.S. Sorry for the short post but I’m working at way at getting my ‘Culinary’ section up and running, along with a pile of …

I’ve been interested in raw foods for a while now but I hadn’t yet dabbled into the actual ‘cooking’/eating of it- until now. I decided I would make a raw cheesecake. As I study to become a holistic nutritionist, I think it is very important to experience many different ways of eating, in order to be able to give effective information to my future clients. I’ll definitely be trying more raw foods but I will probably stick to savoury recipes. I was thinking of purchasing a pack of cookbooks from …